


In a Forsterian Life

by ink2819



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1930s, M/M, Mycroft is a Writer
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2020-05-31 06:40:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19420528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ink2819/pseuds/ink2819
Summary: Mycroft Holmes was a renowned novelist. He and the charming policeman Greg Lestrade met each other at a party in April, 1930 for the Oxford v Cambridge boat race.If you know the tale of Edward Morgan Forster and Bob Buckingham, this would be no surprise to you---They fell in love.This story is loosely based on some facts of Morgan's life, and I promise a very happy ending XD





	1. The Siren

Greg always claimed that, it would only take one look in their eyes for him to know. 

Some of the men, they would hide. Some others would greet his gaze with an almost deranged, boasting bravery, the kind of look you often see on murderers or lunatics. No matter which kind, Greg always thought that the desire in those eyes were all but the same, and that those men only differed in the amount of hope they permitted themselves. 

When Greg saw the novelist that day of the boat race, however, he could not be so sure. On the terrace, tipsy gentlemen in nice linens made small talk and inappropriate comments on the handsome young rowers in the river. Among the rowdy crowd was Holmes, who looked still and tranquil as he sipped modestly from a tall glass of champagne. Greg watched him set eyes gently over the Thames, lost in distant thoughts. 

He was breathtakingly beautiful. 

Greg then turned to his friend for affirmation. 

“He’s just an old queer like the rest of us.” Harry said, waving his hand in the air, already drunk. “Come, come, I’ll introduce ya.” 

“I-I’m not--are you quite certain?” Greg faltered, unsure of himself, but his friend gave him no time to hesitate. ‘Holmes! Holmes!’ yelled Harry as he pushed through the crowd, shoving Greg straight into the poor man’s face eventually as he reached across the terrace. 

“Here, I’d like you to meet my mate from the force, Greg Lestrade.”

Holmes set his glass down in a hurry and greeted Greg with an outstretched hand. “Mycroft Holmes. A pleasure.” 

Greg felt himself suffocated in the warm April breeze by a handshake. Mycroft’s hand was soft, his voice cool and cutting like the champagne froth. 

“I know who you are. I-I’m an admirer.” Greg ran a hand through his own hair, flustered. “O-of your work, I mean.” 

“I say, what are you doing turning shy? He should be the shy one.” Harry said, nudging Greg with his elbow before leaving them to hunt down more booze. 

Mycroft blushed. “Melodrama of triviality, nothing to admire. Nevertheless, I’m much honoured.” 

“That’s just simply untrue!” Greg protested. “You are one of the best authors of this century, sir.” 

Upon hearing himself addressed as ‘sir’, Mycroft shot Greg a mock glare of admonishment.

“Now, there’s no need for that kind of language.” Mycroft said humorously, an almost child-like glee flashed in his eyes, and Greg was possessed with the sudden urge to press him into a wall and snog him senseless. 

“Please, make use of this drink before Harry come back and confistigate it along with the others.” Mycroft passed his champagne into Greg’s hand. Their fingers brushed. 

“Thank you.” said Greg, as he hid his expression into the glass. He politely asked Mycroft if he enjoyed watching the race, and they went from there. Greg, as self conscious as he was, dragged the conversation into a dull exchange of popular literary works. Although Mycroft answered his queries and offered his opinions with the most patience and humility, soon Greg depleted his limited knowledge of great books, and fell into silence and embarrassment. Only then, did Mycroft smile and take the lead of their awkward stiff dance, turning it into a whimsical joust of courtship. 

Pausing, and looking out from the terrace, Mycroft said out of the blue,“On a day like this, I imagine the Siren swims from the estuary and into the Thames, hides beneath the blue green waves to bathe in the warm water---what do you think she’ll make of the boat race?” [1]

Greg was confused but also intrigued by the proposition. “Has she come to enchant all the rowers in the river?” He asked.

Mycroft laughed. “I doubt it. I think she simply attends the event as an observer, like you and I.” He turned to look at Greg, blinking mischievously. “For the festivities, the chatters and the crowd.”

“Blending in unnoticed, you mean?”

“Quite. She dives under the rowers and their boats, and listens to the noises from the shore---hoping.”

“Hoping?”

“Ah, yes. Hoping, hoping that an absent minded young athlete might slip under the surface and into her arms; hoping that for once does not need to sing nor snatch them---then she will finally know that she’s happy.” 

“Was she not happy before?”

“How could she be? The sailors avoided her like the plague. Her victims struggled in her embrace.” 

“But how could she sing so beautifully if she was unhappy?”

Mycroft let out a sigh, a line appeared between his brows, his expression suddenly weary. “She sang as an elaborate trap, of superficiality. She sang the tunes that sailors would love, for mortal ears, but her own sorrows and pleasures she had hidden away in silence, in the gaps of her lines and in the notes she left untouched.”

Greg took in a breath, realizing. Greg was perhaps not very well-read, but he was an intelligent man, and he knew it. He also knew Mycroft had weaved his own feelings inside the fanciful imagination, and he was not willing to leave the matter there. 

So, Greg pressed on. “What if she sings honestly?” 

“Exposing her truths to the world, so we will then really know her, you mean?”

“Yes.” Greg said, watching him. 

Mycroft flashed him a wistful smile. “Who would _dare_ do such a thing?” 

They both went quiet. Mycroft took out a cigarette and Greg scrambled for matches, lit it for him. 

The sunlight was rendering Mycroft almost transparent. He was so pale, so gentle, like a ghost from another era. In the prolonged silence, Greg wanted to reach his arm across the man’s shoulders and escort him to a corner in the shades. Greg wished to tell him that he cared to listen, that all of Mycroft’s songs were safe with him, if only he wished to let on. 

But all Greg came up with after Mycroft puffed through half of his cigarette was, “I hope she lands a good chap, then.”

“What--? Oh, I think she will.” Mycroft said, grey blue eyes squinting, looking at Greg through fans of pale lashes. “I think she will indeed.”

They stood in a world of washed out green and gold scenery of spring, and talked the whole afternoon enthusiastically. When the party came to an end later that day, Mycroft remained an enigma to Greg, yet Greg knew he had fallen for the older man. 

In the nights that came after, Greg had the weirdest dream, that Mycroft and him were on a small boat. Mycroft sat in the inclined position at one end, reading a book, while Greg stood at the other, propelling them forward with a push pole. The river shimmered under the sun, surrounding them in ethereal brilliance. Greg felt like they were floating on a foil of gold, and somehow he must have spoken his thoughts out loud in the dream. Mycroft shot him a glance behind the book, and with piercing, wise eyes, he replied, “we are, my dear.” And then the water descended as if it has been drained away into the void. Their boat remained in its place, until the ground, the earth left them far behind, then Greg realized their boat was balancing on the tapered tip of a gigantic monument. They must have been close to a hundred feet high, up in the air, resting on a pin point. [2]

Mycroft was composed and inscrutable as always, he dangled his book at the side of the boat and loosened his grip. Leaflets flapped their fat wings and slipped from his fingers, morphing into a sworn of snowy white doves. The flock crowded Greg’s sight, spun over their heads thrice more and disappeared over the horizon.

Mycroft spoke to him, “After the flood, the water receded.” 

“And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.”

“The lord then promised that he will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth.” 

Greg looked down. The earth lay bare beneath. The world had died. 

They were alone at last. 

* * *

Mycroft knew very well that loneliness was poisoning him in a slow and meticulous manner. He never quite considered himself a great man, yet his dissatisfaction made him petty and bitter, and overtime had turned him into a jealous, miserable, pathetic being. 

He often found himself standing behind the window of his empty flat, watching the people as they passed through Brunswick Square. A lot of them couples--middle class, upper class, working class, emerging from coaches and cars and street corners with hooked arms. He would bless those who were happy in each other’s company, yet he could not help but to be selfishly sorrowful, for his own love seemed destined to remain unrequited. 

The ever-changing coupling of Mycroft’s own circle of friends overwhelmed him. Some were constantly on the run, hiding their relations from curious eyes and gossip, while some men were simply too frivolous in nature to stay attached. So few homosexual relationships were ever lucky enough to survive in the margins of society. 

Mycroft’s love remained just as naive as it was in his youth. It belonged in the courtyards and dormitories of the university, where affections lived on pure camaraderie and a passion for the Greeks. 

Decades now, out into the world, Mycroft had not found its equivalent. 

Ah, and there was Greg. The fine young policeman whom he met in April. They remained inseparable since the party, seeing each other every week at movies, theaters and restaurants.Mycroft lent him books to read, walked with him along the Thames at night, talking about everything and nothing, passing cigarettes back and forth. It was all Mycroft could ever ask for---

Was it, though?

A few days ago, Harry mocked Mycroft’s cowardice over some God awful wine, “I’m utterly surprised that you two haven’t shagged till now. Shall I remind you that neither of you are exactly trampling on the early days of your youths here. Are you waiting until one of you get a stroke?”

Mycroft rolled his eyes at him. “I am not, Greg is---”

“What?” Harry cut him off. “What’s wrong with Lestrade? I thought he was just the type of man you---” 

“---of course I want him, Harry.” Mycroft said, perhaps a little too eager. “I just want him...differently.”

“In for the long haul, are you?” Harry shook his head. “Then I’m afraid you are not very lucky, old boy. He is not the sort to stick around.” 

Mycroft had nothing to say back. He watched Harry swirl his wine excessively in front of him. _It’s not going to make it taste any better._ He thought. 

Then came the weekend, and Mycroft invited Greg to see Noel Coward’s new play. ‘Private Lives’, it was called. Only after Mycroft arrived at the Phoenix Theatre did he realize that the play was perhaps a little too domestic in theme for the pair of them. [3]

The play was a daring comedic depiction of marriage. Considering the sort of relationship they were in, it really was not very fitting at all. Mycroft looked around nervously, waiting for Greg to appear, and contemplated on bailing. Make up an excuse, that he was feeling unwell---with his own pale and ill coloured face, it would not be a problem. Greg would never find out the true reason behind his abrupt departure, and he would not have to risk their friendship. 

Mycroft knew what he was so scared of. It was the truth. He feared the intimate scenes and the committal dialogues on stage would remind Greg of the unspoken subtexts of their association. 

A gentleman of wealth and status, befriending an attractive working class man, taking him to nice places around town, would want something in return. There was only one eventuality to this classic scenario. Mycroft knew this, and he was sure Greg knew it, too. It was only a matter of time, a matter of...when Mycroft would say the word.

Then what?

Mycroft presumed that like any of his past dalliances, as soon as either of them made an advance, their short-lived affair would end in an awkward, wordless coition. Mycroft could only hope that Greg would be decent enough to not ask for payment afterwards.

Money was never the problem, but it would break his heart.

Foolish dreams, he knew. Nevertheless, he wanted a friend, whom he could trust and rely on. 

Not just anyone, he wanted Greg as a friend, candid, kind, witty in a boyish, careless way, perhaps a little uncouth, but...genuine.

Mycroft had not yet made up his mind to desert the scene, but Greg was late. Standing anxiously by the entrance of the building, every titter and whisper from the street unsettled him. 

When Greg finally pushed through the crowd a few minutes later, Mycroft could not suppress the smile on his face. He forgot to fret, and was at once lifted up by the sense of warmth and security brought by his friend’s arrival. 

“Sorry.” Greg came close and flashed him an apologetic expression. “You’ve been waiting long?” 

Greg had freshen up, put on a much nicer outfit than his usual wear. He put something in his hair, the strands all sleek and slicked back, like silver satin.

“N-no, just a few minutes, not to worry.” Mycroft replied stiffly, a little awestruck. 

“Well then, shall we?” Greg smiled at him, eyes bright with excitement.

Mycroft blinked at him, only realizing a moment later that Greg was waiting for him to lead the way. “Of course-of course. Let’s-um, this way.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] "The Story of the Siren" is one of Forster's short stories. The dialogue I wrote have little to do with the actual work. However, if you're interested, there's a version of "The Story of the Siren" read by the wonderful Dan Stevens on Youtube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uI7tXFd5XsQ
> 
> [2] Here in the dream Greg sees himself on a boat with Mycroft. The boat balances on a giant monument---an obelisk---Which is the title of another short story written by EM Forster, published after his death along with some other works of homosexual themes. I haven't had the chance to read "The Obelisk", but the object ( a tall, narrow, tapering stone pillar erected as a monument or land mark...XD) really made me laugh when I first saw it, it's just so damn phallic. The ultimate phallic.
> 
> [3] "Private Lives" is a lovely 1930 comedy of manners in three acts by Noël Coward. The play premiered in August, 1930 in Edinburgh and came to London's new Phoenix Theatre five weeks later. The timeline in this story would probably be a few months earlier than that, but I just can't help featuring this play XD, it's that good.


	2. I See London!

Greg smiled to himself as he settled in his chair, noting how their shoulders barely brushed in their adjacent seats. If Greg was not sure before, he was more than certain now.

Mycroft hid his secrets in his straight back and his blank expressions, but his stiff shoulders betrayed him. 

And as the play went on, Lord, how blatantly obvious, focusing his gaze entirely on the stage whenever the actors touched so much as the tip of their fingers, pretending nothing was amiss.

Greg knew desire, especially when it was suppressed. 

To think that he spent all those previous days around the man, feeling unsure and self conscious to the core, Greg would almost laugh aloud in disbelief. He had a lot of men, all the types there were. He was never fazed by the grimy hand that snaked around his waist, nor the gloved fists that held his neck against alley walls, and he definitely had no objections to the shy boys whose hands he had to guide toward the right place. 

Greg knew what each of those men want, and he provided. In the end, he _made up_ what they want.

It was only a matter of time,then, a matter of figuring out which type of man Mycroft Holmes secretly was.

* * *

“Oh dear.” Greg said at a comedic point of the play while the audience broke out laughing around them, wiping an invisible tear from the corner of his left eye. He turned to Mycroft and, in the gold sheen of stage light, found him looking back. They smiled at each other, surrounded by a roaring darkness filled with joy. 

“When you said we’re going to see a play, I didn’t expect it to be nearly as good as this.” Greg whispered into Mycroft’s ear, leaning close so he could be heard. He carried a faint, dizzying sweet scent of the wine. 

“I’m glad you like it.” Mycroft replied, eyes flicking back to Greg and then quickly away. 

“Where are we going after this?”Greg asked.

“I--I haven’t given it much thought, really.” Mycroft struggled for a reply, and from the corner of his eye, saw Greg’s arm reached around the back of his seat.

“Maybe I can take you across the street for a few more drinks, and then walk you home…?” Greg licked his upper lip, “Is that something you want?”

And all Mycroft could do was nod back. 

They were in Soho, afterall. 

“Diabolical.” ---was Mycroft’s reply to Greg’s question of “How d’you fancy the whiskey”. The streets of London warped into a field of cushions beneath their drunken feet, and so they held each other up. Mycroft was laughing about something Greg said an hour ago, a joke, perhaps, though Greg insisted that it was in fact Mycroft who told the joke. 

“No,no, it was you. You said---” Greg mumbled in excitement, a hand waving above his head before he propelled himself out of Mycroft’s embrace and fell sitting on the solid ground. The man went on to talk from below, a hand planted on the dirty ground, as if he himself did not notice the incident. “You said--I can’t remember the blasted thing, ah---Oh yes! Some clever thing about an omnibus.”[1]

“Are you quite alright?” Mycroft asked, kneeling down next to him for close inspection.

“‘M fine, stop fussin’.” Greg said dismissively. His hand found Mycroft’s sleeve and tugged. “Come sit down, we’ll take a little break.”

Mycroft obeyed. His ears were ringing and his head was a bucket full of tumbling stones, his muscles relaxes as he shifted to a sitting position. _There goes the suit trousers_. He thought. He had sat by the street, too drunk to walk home past midnight exactly once before in his life, and it was back in his university days.

“I take no interest in omnibuses, Greg, it was you who said it.” He said a moment later.

“Oh but it was clever! so surely it was you---you are the smartest person in the whole bloody world!” 

“Gregory, do stop making outrageous statements about me.”

“No.” came the terse response. Greg took the moment as an opportunity for him to pout. “Never. You are clever, you’re talented, you have more brain than the entire population of England combined---” 

Mycroft realized in some degree of horror that they were conveniently positioned in the narrow street between two very tall buildings, and the sound of Greg’s many complements echoed all the way up to the moon. 

“An’ your nose---” Greg continued, pointing.

“What about my nose?” 

“‘S interesting.” Greg said, looking at Mycroft quite innocently. 

“Say hideous if you wish to.” Mycroft huffed.

Greg shook his head. “No, it’s nothin’ like that.”

Then came the whispering sound of Greg shifting nearer. “Makes you kinda pretty.” He went on to say. 

“-oh.” 

“Y’know, makes me wanna…” For the hundredth time that evening, Greg looked at him with a bright smile. Mycroft breathed in the moist air, pinning the exact moment his blood surged as he realized in his foggy mind how close Greg’s face was to his already. 

They have left the busy streets of Soho behind, not another soul around them, the world was doused in quiet grey and fuzzy lampshade. Mycroft had been blaming his blush on the influence of alcohol the entire night, but there was no use lying about it now. 

“Can I ask--?” Greg whispered, blinking.

“...Yes?”

But something in Greg’s expression changed as he halted. He dropped his eyes the next second, and went into a long pause, for a while there were just the two of them, breathing to fill the void of speech.

The moment had died as they waited in silence. They waited some more, until the remnants dissipated fully into the night sky. Mycroft felt as if his heart was twisted like a piece of wet rag. A peculiar feeling caught up to Mycroft. It was as if he was a man on death row hearing bird chimes from outside his cell.

The noose strung tight, his pulse had ceased, only silence remained. 

In such silence, Greg shook his head again. Whether he was shaking away a matured thought or the corpse of a question drowned in spirits, Mycroft could not deduce. 

Greg spoke, eventually, “Were we arguing just now?”

“We were.” Though Mycroft could not remember what it was about.

“Can’t remember what for.” Greg held a hand to his temple. “I shouldn’t have, that last round.”

“Indeed.” 

“‘M drunk out of my mind.”

“So am I.”

Greg grasped Mycroft’s elbow and shook it.“You don’t feel much like a proper person, y’konw.”

“However so?” 

“You’re like, like if you’re made of just bones, bones! Or steel...just, how cold you are--aren’t you cold?”

“I am not.”

“Am I gonna wake up tomorrow mornin n’ find meself hugging a lamp post by the street?” Greg asked. “you a lamp post, Holmes?”

Mycroft pressed his lips together and considered. “I doubt it.”

“Well, you’re sure tall and skinny like one n’ Givin’ me some very short answers, Holmes.” Greg said as he gestured for them to keep moving toward their destination, Mycroft’s little flat in Brunswick Square. “Somethin’ on your mind?”

“I fear at this rate we will get ourselves arrested instead of making to the flat, dear boy.” Mycroft channeled strength in his leg as he helped himself up, and fought the urge to simply collapse into a pile of shapeless flesh. 

“I AM the police, you dolt.” Greg giggled as he half stood, and swayed his body forward--almost face planting himself to the ground. Mycroft caught him before he lost balance completely, pulling him up. He was laughing, for even the sound of their shoe soles skipping and shifting against the pavement was all of a sudden terribly amusing. 

Greg took a moment to steady himself, then wrapped one strong arm around Mycroft’s back, hand clasping firmly on his shoulder. In the shadow cast by the street lamps and moon light, stood two man leaning against each other like a pair of injured soldiers in the Great War. Greg’s other fist went up into the air with all the force he could muster. 

“Onward!” shouted Greg into the fog ahead, and Mycroft felt for a moment as if he had returned to his twenties. 

Greg remembered what the fight was about when he took another hard landing on Mycroft’s exotic carpet. “Holmes, Omnnn-bus!” He yelled, just a moment after Mycroft let him slipped out of his hold. “I demand a glass of your finest---whatever.” 

Mycroft turned toward him from the other side of the room, having adjusted the light and shed his jacket. “Gregory, you are too drunk if you can’t even pronounce the word ‘omnibus’.”

“You did it too!” Greg tilted his head back against the seat of the sofa, laughing.

How he loved that laugh. 

The room was half dark. Mycroft dragged himself back to Greg, hand feeling around the edges of furniture that stood in his way, and slumped onto the sofa with a grunt. “You have misheard. I did not.” He said.

“No--you did! Say it again.” 

“I will do no such thing.” Mycroft smiled softly at the man sitting in his room with ruffled hair and an open collar. Somehow he had failed to take note of the disintegration of Greg’s civilized appearance. Perhaps it happened on their way back, when all was chaos, or perhaps Mycroft was simply too drunk to notice. Greg might as well have taken his own necktie as a headband and he would not think it odd. 

A hand found his wrist--his cuff, to be exact. The skin so warm it burned a little. Greg was looking at him with a silly smile. “Do say it again.” 

“No.” Mycroft put on a straight face. 

“Just say the word. Say---Ommmibus.” 

Mycroft decided to yield. He took a deep breath.

“Omnibus.” He said quietly. His head felt so damn heavy. 

“There! You’re too drunk…like the rest’f us.” Greg laughed as he toppled over, lying down on the carpet.

“No one else here but the two of us, my dear.” Mycroft stared down at Greg, who sprawled across the floor and had now closed his eyes, humming. 

_Hair._ Thought Mycroft, as he observed the magnificent strands that fell across Greg’s sweaty forehead in the dim light. When he closed his eyes for a moment, came the fleeting image of his fingers running through those strands, buried in a head of silver. 

Mycroft frowned. 

From the sports team captains in his teen to the beautiful brown skinned sicillian boys on his holiday, Mycroft Holmes was never good enough. After so many burns and tears, his heart had learned to shy away from daylight, lest its own pathetic value was revealed under the piercing brilliance. 

But in front of him stood Apollo himself, and he knew there was no way out. 

The next thing he knew, he was leaning down, reaching his hand toward Greg. When his fingertips landed gently on Greg’s temple, the man stirred and opened his eyes. 

_Eyes._ Mycroft shivered. Eyes like the darkest of liquor. 

“Do get up from the floor.” Mycroft heard himself say.

“You come n’ lie down b’side me.” Greg said as his warm hand found Mycroft’s and lightly squeezed.

Mycroft seemed be losing chunks of his memory. He vaguely remembered his knees coming into contact with the floor, the rise and fall of Greg’s broad chest, and the wrinkles of his shirt causing discomfort on his back. 

“I think I might be sick.” He whispered

“Shut up, you’re alright, here.” Greg huffed and threw an arm behind him. Mycroft lifted his head obediently and rested on Greg. “I still think you ought to move to the bed once you could, Gregory. One cannot possibly offer one's friend to spend the whole night on the carpet.”

Mycroft’s own words perhaps came out a lot more jumbled up than how he imagined them in his head, because Greg did not seem to comprehend a single syllable of his sentence. 

“Yeah, right. Ommmibus.” Greg said, turning on his side before plunging his head under Mycroft’s chin. 

His breaths burned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] Came from the title of EM Forster's short story "The Celestial Omnibus". The most fanciful work of fiction I've read in a while. It has a straight up Harry Potter feel, not gonna lie. The horse drawn omnibuses back in the day also looked hilarious to me XD.


	3. A Wondrous Muddle

If pain had a colour, it would be yellow tinted like the light that hung from Mycroft’s bathroom ceiling. His vision was blotched with spots of darkness. The air sizzled like a cigarette butt muffled in water. The world was spinning. Pain rang in his ears. 

He was convinced that his head was twice its size, and his arms had shrunk into pins, but when he looked down at his hands, he failed to coordinate what he felt to what he saw. 

Yellow, was what he saw. He saw a cigarette smoked room, but no one was smoking. He saw the floor tiles drenched in a thick layer of amber tar. He blinked and it all went back to perfect porcelain white. 

Pain was what he saw. Pain like a caged sparrow that slammed head first into concrete for release. He was an injured beast. He was a tangled ball of nerves and mere instincts. 

He was a simple creature. He just writhes until the pain leaves him be. 

Mycroft felt himself fumbling on the buttons of his trousers. He pulled out his hardened cock from the rumpled clothing, the pink swollen length jumped out at him, against his pale abdomen and his blueish veins. It looked angry to him, stood tall with vigor, ripened and full to the point of bursting. He took himself in hand. He saw no other way. He pumped with forceful fist until he felt numb, tingling sensation pulsed through his body more viciously than he had ever known it to be. He let his body spasm with pleasure as he bit down the sounds. He was a lump of flesh. He was a huff of breath, a heart beat, an organ.

A cock, a pair of bollocks. He was an illusion, a radio static, a noise. He was an echo of a name waiting to click in his throat, waiting to travel through his tongue.

Greg. Greg. Greg. Greg. Greg.

Precome oozed out of the tip and spread over the head under his palm. like a squashed fruit, it dripped out juice all down its sides.

He was a wish, a whisper, a moan that almost, barely called the name.

Greg.

Mycroft had no name, no thoughts, and therefore he had no shame.

He came everywhere, white warm stripes fell across the hem of his shirt and over his hand. He laid back, His body greasy with sweat and heat, dazed out with a palm full of filth. 

The light still hurt, the pain still flared. Perhaps a little gentler now, behind the moisture in his eyes.

Mycroft remembered that time when he was five years old. He made a mess with paint in the smoking room of his Great Aunt’s house. It was an accident, a playful afternoon alone that went out of hand. He remembered standing in front of the aftermath, utterly helpless, waiting to be reprimanded, or beaten and chased out of the house with something big and heavy.

Of course, Mycroft rarely received any beating growing up, due to a lack of, well, men, in his household. 

* * *

  


The man sat on the floor with closed eyes, his head tilted back, frail and relaxed, his beautiful length was naked and freshly spent, lay softening in his hand. His trousers pulled down to mid thigh, a thick tuft of curled auburn strands sprang from his groin.

_God._

Greg stood, awestruck. He was not sure what he was seeing till he fully entered the room. When he realized, his instinct was to back out of the crowded space and pretend he never saw anything, but something in the scene before him flooded his heart with protectiveness.

“Mycroft…” He murmured. 

The man on the floor groaned and peered through flustering lashes. He froze. 

Greg could never forget how the dread flashed through Mycroft’s widened eyes, and how that look immediately split his heart in half. 

Mycroft visibly trembled, curling his body in defense. 

Greg's body lunged forward without him telling it to. His knees hit the hard tiles with a low pang and felt his bones struggled to take up the impact. He shook the pain away, wrapped Mycroft with his arms and held him in a crushing embrace. Mycroft collapsed into him. He was shaking all over. 

As soon as he gained some strength, the man tried to run away from the tight space between them, but Greg seized his elbow and held him in place. 

“You utter fool.” Greg muttered, rocking a little.

“I’m-I---” Mycroft opened his mouth, all the colour gone from his quivering lips, he managed to squeak. 

Stuck in the horrible muddle of intoxication, out of breath and flimsy, the ceiling spun above them. 

Greg dragged and pulled him all the way to the bed and threw them both over the mattress with a grunt.

“Bloody hell, Mycroft, the state of you.” 

Mycroft answered with a string of apologies and disjointed sentences of self blame. “such a fool.” Greg remarked, propping himself up before taking hold of Mycroft’s face. Quite miraculously, Mycroft did not shake or bat his hands away.

“Have you any idea how much I....” Greg shook his head. He wanted to laugh, but a painful huff of air is all he could manage. “and you're here...wasting it.” 

“Greg--” Mycroft swallowed what could have been a sob. “I-I’m sorry.” 

“Stop. Stop apologizin’” Greg said with a trace of impatience, pushing the sullied clothes off of Mycroft’s shoulder. 

“I don’t get you, Mycroft Holmes.” Greg mumbled as he gathered Mycroft into his arms again. He was so out of his world, and yet so human. “I really don’t get you at all.” 

  


Greg decided he would not mention it if Mycroft don’t, for the sake of pride, or something else, then everything might just be alright. He had been comfortable with Mycroft, but the ambiguity of their relationship had made matter delicate. It all sort of happened naturally, they did not discuss boundaries, Greg guessed neither of them had the courage.

It was going so well. Why ruin it all with conversations uncalled for? It was all going so, so well---well, it’s all ruined now anyways. Greg did not know how the likes of Mycroft Holmes cope with things once the delicate balance is broken. He assumed they just avoid revisiting those events entirely and go on about their social lives as usual. 

It was Greg’s own fault, he was the one who decided to meddle with the Great Mycroft Holmes, guess the upper-class-typical loaded silence was only customary. 

Should have known better. 

Greg should be glad enough though, shouldn’t he? As Greg glanced beside him with sleepy eyes, and saw a full head of soft, dark auburn half concealed in the pillow - then the crescent shell of a pink ear, Greg’s heart sang with the busy morning sound of London. 

Nevermind, there’s nothing better.

Greg slid out of bed with barely a sound and realized he woke up early. They closed the curtains but failed to shut it tight. It was a rare sunny day, the light must have breached through and disturbed him. 

Greg had visited the flat a few times before, for tea. Mycroft would usually sit him down and fetch him something to read, while he himself would always be settling before a desk to scribble down letters or drafts. “I will be with you in a moment.” He would say, “so shall the tea.” 

If their afternoons do not continue, Greg would be heartbroken no doubt. 

He made use of the gas ring in the kitchen and fixed an omelette. [1] It may have taken longer than it should, but Greg was quite pleased with himself. When he carried the plate out, mycroft had already risen and was sitting at his desk with a pen in his hand. 

“I am sincerely sorry and feel quite mortified with my behavior last night, Lestrade.” He said, with a fairly diplomatic tone that made Greg skeptical. “I can only wish that you’d be kind and accommodating enough to put it behind us.” 

Mycroft had put on his radio broadcast voice. For a man in the same room with Greg, he sounded so far away. 

“All’s forgiven. An’ I cooked eggs.” Greg said, revealing no particular emotion in his response, but he perhaps set the plate down with too much force. It produced a clang that made Mycroft startle. 

“I-no, thank you.” 

“Have it.” 

Mycroft glanced up at him thoughtfully for a brief moment, then went back to writing. “Perhaps later. I need to finish this letter, this really should not wait.” 

“Suit yourself.” Greg pulled a wooden arm chair around and sat by the other side. 

For a few minutes or so, they sat in silence.

Then, Mycroft let out a sigh. “I’ve irritated you.” 

“Are you done with that?” Greg squinted at him.

Mycroft glanced back down at his letter. He wasn’t, but it was clearly beside the point. “Why?” He asked. 

“I don’t know, why don’t you tell me instead? You’re the observant one.” 

Mycroft set his pen aside with a click “Lestrade.” 

“Holmes.” Greg retorted. They tried to stare each other down and locked in a seemingly permanent stalemate. Greg looked into the stormy blue eyes of the man he admired full heartedly for years, whose acquaintance was perhaps the most fortunate thing that would happen in his whole life. Mycroft had an incredible gaze, that at any other time, any other man would be crippled with fear by that stare, but Greg’s mind was taken up by some other emotions entirely at the moment.

It was a ridiculous thought, and he did want to make a scene, there was no stopping him. “Is it because I’m with the force?”

“What?” Mycroft shook his head in confusion. 

“Haven’t had enough schoolin’, too lower class for your snobby arse.” 

“What does your background have to do with anything?”

“I’m not exactly ashamed of my assets, you know.” Greg said, then realized his boasting and blushed a little. He pressed on, nonetheless. “Some men’s begged for it to happen to them, you know.” 

Mycroft’s expression slackened with realization. “I do not wish to force myself upon you, Greg.” 

“Y’what?”

“The last thing I want is for you to oblige just because you think I want something---I never meant for you to feel dejected.” 

Greg looked at him in disbelief. “You twat.” 

“Me-what?”

“All this time, you were just sittin’ there waitin’ fer me to offer?”

“I would not call it ‘waiting’, as it is for something very unlikely to happen.” Mycroft took in a breath and picked up his pen once more, appearing uncannily calm. 

“I’m offerin’ _now_ , aren’t I?”

Mycroft reached the end of his sheet, then proceeded on a new page.

“Very well.” He said, in sync with the scratch of pen tip on top of paper.

“Getting nervous now eh?” Greg said, folding his arms and sitting back in his chair.

“You are mistaken.” Mycroft lifted his brows, eyes fixed on his writing. “I’ll just finish my long overdue letter to Virginia, and-”[2]

“Then what?” Greg asked, grinning. 

“Then I shall decide what to do with you in a moment.” Mycroft shot Greg a severe look that made him drop his smug smirk in an instant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] In "E.M. Forster: A New Life", a biography beautifully written by Wendy Moffat, I accidently stumbled on this lovely detail about Forster and his lover's private domestic interaction, of how Bob could fix an omelette for him on the gas ring of his Brunswick Square flat.
> 
> [2] Virginia is the great Virginia Woolf, of course.


	4. To the Ones Who Survived

“Come.” He said. 

With an elegant curl of his hand, Mycroft beckoned Greg closer. 

Simple words, but it was like the air around him had changed somehow. Greg had never seen anyone so fully in control and confidant. He got up from his seat, walked past the desk near Mycroft as the man folded his letter in thirds and tucked it into an envelope, taking his time as he did so. 

Greg stood and waited, feeling the floaty sensation catching up with him from last night’s overindulgence of spirits. The world was still a bit surreal and out of focus. 

He watched as Mycroft wrote down the address. His penmanship was a little more blase than Greg originally imagined - Greg remembered how he first saw it in a card and felt intrigued. It was the first thing he received from Mycroft.

Frankly, at the time, he thought it was the only thing he’ll ever get from the man, and couldn’t quite believe his luck from the bestowed honour. 

“Alright.” The writer said, voice like velvet, announcing his finalization of the task. He turned his chair slightly and gave Greg a quick once over. 

“Lower, on the floor for me.” Mycroft instructed, and Greg’s knees hit the carpet with a thud.

Mycroft tilted his head, observing him with cool eyes that revealed nothing more than a faint interest. Greg felt suddenly wearier than he had ever been, wondering if he had forgotten his place, a little earlier, if Mycroft was making him wait on purpose, as a way of reclaiming his control, perhaps. 

Every room Mycroft entered, he was respected. He was never short of fame, status or authority, whereas Greg - Greg was easily disposable, easily replaceable, wasn’t he? There won’t be much time until his youth and beauty no longer hold, and whether Mycroft Holmes prefers his men to carry a little roughness around the edges, or loathe them for it, was entirely Mycroft’s own business.

Greg knew his concerns may have been unfounded, but it made him careful. He sat back on his legs until Mycroft leaned down towards him and said, “closer.” This time a little softer, yet still a command. 

So Greg offered his body swiftly forward, and Mycroft graced him with a kiss. 

Lips that were cool, thin and tight on his. It almost felt like kissing a statue alive, the way something cracked and stirred in Mycroft with each succeeding press of their lips - until Mycroft let out a shuddering breath through his nose and, breathed the air between them aflame.

Bold, once he established a rhythm, dragged his lips against Greg’s and demanded for access - then he was suddenly exerting everything into it, raw and desperate, as if he was determined to abandon every trace of timidity behind. 

Greg was strangely holding himself back a little, as he played along pliantly, reciprocating his counterpart. He wondered if the activeness, a role he usually took in these occasions, was in fact a way of avoidance. Because the moment he submitted into Mycroft’s touch, he was lead down a road of discoveries, full of sensations he once neglected. He was free to just feel, to notice that neither of them had shaved this morning, and the heavenly sensation that light stubbles produced, skin on skin. 

The way Mycroft dug his fingers into Greg’s hair - Greg allowed himself to be surprised. A noise slipped out from his mouth, and he somewhat regretted it immediately, unsure of whether Mycroft would take it as an encouragement or warning, because Mycroft was so polite and reserved with the world - 

But instead of a pause or a concerned inquiry, what followed was the claw, the grasp and the yank, with each Greg’s body responded with the same sound in utter delight, and Mycroft became aware of his leverage fairly quickly. With a bit of teeth, he grazed over Greg’s lip, and it made both of them smile. He was flaunting. 

Still kissing Mycroft, Greg reached down a hand and tugged at Mycroft’s trousers, pulling it lower at the waist. Mycroft was fully hard - the tension under the fabric was there, as familiar as his own. 

He could feel his body preparing for the work that lay ahead. His mind braced itself, for the vision, the smell, secreting the fluid that flooded the tip of his tongue. 

He must have licked his lips while he was doing it. If it weren’t so degenerate, he’d almost call it second nature. 

Under the work of his fingers, Mycroft’s body stilled, the noise that came out of him was a bit strained. “N-no.” Greg heard him say, as their mouths broke apart. 

“What?” Greg came to a stop, he looked back at Mycroft, confused. 

Mycroft just shook his head, took hold of Greg’s wrists and lifted them away. “You have had previous experience with...of your own sex, yes?” He asked, a bit breathless. 

“Plenty.” Greg said, frowning, he did not see the point. 

“Good.” Mycroft said, his thumbs swiping over Greg’s inner wrists with the gentlest of pressure. “Then you’ll know to...only those that are pleasurable for _you_.” 

“You can count on me about that, Mr Holmes.” 

Mycroft flinched a little. “Please don’t.” 

“Mycroft, then.” 

The man nodded, cheeks red like the clouds of dawn caught on fire.

“Mycroft.” Greg let the words linger between his lips, as the sound of its last consonant cut through the air like a sharp blade, they were kissing again. 

Mycroft pushed himself out of his seat and dropped to the floor with Greg. As their faces leveled, Greg recalled himself saying “come down ‘ere with me” over and over again to Mycroft through the previous night, and how Mycroft always complied without a word.

Then it dawned on him: it would have been like this, had he dared to kiss Mycroft, sitting out on the pavement pass midnight. 

_This_ \- thought Greg, as he felt the swipe of tongue across the roof of his mouth - was what they could have shared, tumbling by the sofa in the living room with lamp light still low. 

It was the same way both of them knelt over the bathroom tiles, shaking with feelings they could not yet say. 

God, It took so many times to get it right. 

“If only I had known sooner...Why did I not ask you sooner?” Greg groaned as he pressed his mouth to Mycroft’s tender throat. 

“I wished to tell you, every time, I - ”

If Greg did not know before, he was a fool for ever thinking otherwise. It was plain as day, in the way they held each other, shredding all their pretences away. It was in the way each time Mycroft had fell for him at his first request, casting aside his pride. It was Mycroft’s way of giving in, his way of being honest. 

“The days we wasted,” Greg said as he got up, pulling Mycroft to his feet. “the _nights_ we wasted.” He took the man’s soft hands in his own, guiding him backwards as if they were in a dance. 

“Show me.” Mycroft whispered into his ear once they reached the bed, warm from the sunlight and tidied not long ago when Mycroft got out of it. There was a particular satisfaction in knowing that they would be ruining it once more. “We’ll make good the loss with the nights and days ahead of us yet.” 

* * *

When Mycroft opened his eyes again in the afternoon, he woke up to a lovely sunshower. He slipped out of the heavy enclosure created by Greg’s sleepy arm, fetched something to cover his bare shoulders, and walked barefoot to his window. 

It was a strange sight, how the London Scene looked more vibrant than ever before as rain poured from above. Even the patches of shades were doused with colours of their own. 

Mycroft went to put the kettle on, and upon his return saw a robin squatting on the other side of the glass. A pale grey shadow was flustering under its beak - it had caught a moth. As Mycroft watched, the insect stretched its wings wide open as a final strive for its life, and froze forever in that state of bloom, like a white rose against the robin’s read chest. 

The bird blinked and jerked its little head at Mycroft, looking too intelligent and idiotic at the same time. 

“You had me frettin’ for a moment.” 

Mycroft jumped a little at the voice. Of course, it was Greg - he had been living by himself for too long, indeed. 

He turned around and saw Greg sitting on the edge of his bed, sheets twisted across his waist and thighs, a foot dangling above the floor. He smiled back at Greg, feeling his cheeks heat up a little. 

“Watching the rain?” Greg asked, pushing the covers away from his body. 

“Yes.” Mycroft watched him rise, admiring how his body faced the open air with ease, and how the sunlight seemed to melt gloriously on his tanned skin. 

Greg body looked anew, a map of knowledge and memories shared by no one else. 

When Mycroft turned back to the window, the bird was long gone.

Arms appeared under his elbows and reached around his waist. Greg was standing behind him, pressing their bodies close. 

For a second, Mycroft wanted to double over and defend the soft flesh of his middle - but it was only Greg - Greg who held him like so just a few hours ago. Mycroft lifted his arms a little, paralized as the poor moth. 

Greg’s jaw rested on his shoulder, digging a slightly into his frame as he spoke. “It’s sunny. We might get to see a rainbow - ” Then an arm left Mycroft’s body abruptly and pointed forward, “there it is!” 

\- Strange, to feel another man’s excitement in his chest, his heart overlapping yours, pounding in close proximity. 

“The bow of promise.” Mycroft commented, looking up to Greg’s guiding hand. Yes, a rainbow, or rather a fragment of one, hiding behind some buildings and disappearing before it could form half an arch. It was faint.

“The Promise of God, you say?” Greg’s voice was close to his ear.

“Quite.” 

“D’you think it means forgiveness?”

“I think it marks the first time humans realized that God was too cruel.” Mycroft said, leaning back a little, testing. “And we made the rainbow a badge for those who survived his tyranny.” 

Greg’s body held firm, so he relaxed his weight by the smallest increment into the embrace. 

“Was he ever, you know... too cruel to you, then?”

“I don’t believe so. There were perhaps mistreatments, which I deserved for my own shortcomings. The early adolescent years were the worst.” Mycroft considered, looking down at the hands that rested on his waist. Quite the opposite of his, in form and complexion, in characters, too, perhaps. “My peers took pleasure in my misery, and occasionally, when the jeers were not enough, they took to violence. But then I made it to King’s. That place was a deliverance in itself.” [1]

Hands moved slowly to his chest, catching the hair there between fingers. A warm kiss was pressed to his cheek. “So you’re a survivor, then.” 

“If we are prone to honouring people for living through what life simply should have been.” 

“No one deserves to be treated like that.” 

“Those were the rules of the game.” Mycroft covered Greg’s hand with his own. Greg’s hand was a calm display of strength, tendons strung like strings of the lyre. “My mother used to say, we should be thankful for even the smallest mercies in life, and not moan over the lack thereof.”

“Quotin’ from your mother, hmm?” Greg’s soft lips were latched on to his ear. 

“The wisest thing she ever said.” Mycroft replied, before he heard the sharp monotone noise coming from his stove top. 

“Tea.” He said, pressing a kiss to Greg’s mouth as he went away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] According to "A New Life", Forster was unhappy during his time at Tonbridge School, where he was subjected to perhaps the most crude bullying of his life. When he was eighteen years of age, the torment was finally over as he was offered an entrance to King's College Cambridge.


	5. A Single Man

As usual, one wakes with the first instinct to hide. 

To rise is to admit one's sins of the yesterdays past, and face, however reluctantly, the duty of guilt in the coming future. 

Mycroft stared into the ceiling, thinking, ‘one did not expect these things when one breaks out into life from the womb of a mother.’ 

To pull oneself out of a comforting shelter, be it the soft linen covers or the flesh of a woman; to wash, to groom, to breathe a fog onto the mirror and wipe it away, revealing the mask of a stranger; to work, walk amongst other drones on the streets, playing a part. 

\----one does all those things not out of natural instinct, it is so one can maintain a womb-like shelter to return to, to sleep, to hide back in the oblivion before one’s birth. 

Tedious, is it not.

Mycroft, as all members in the Holmes lineage, took pride in the authoritarian control of his mind over his body. He thrived in routines and would be lost without a purpose. 

‘You’d make a wonderful husband one day.’ His mother used to say. 

After so many years of devout practice, Mycroft’s mornings were almost ritualistic. He had no trouble levering himself out of bed, putting on the skin we call ‘man’. Then he jumped in his usual attire and became a particular sort of man - camouflaged in one specific crowd, but distinctive in the rest of the population. 

Mycroft’s suit of choice today was catered towards his guest from the British Broadcasting Corporation, a relatively new institution founded not so many years ago. ‘This is the future’--everyone said, and Mycroft agreed, he was indeed very fond of the BBC. 

So he dressed in a comforting warm grey, abandoning the decorations that might appear stuffy to some eyes. 

The bed turned cold behind Mycroft as the first hour passed, his throat was sour and his insides caved, there was a growling stomach that must be fed. 

He must portion his meals - lest the loaded blood plumped his veins and clouded his brain when he should be in his chair, over his desk and working. 

\- Both furniture he chose carefully some years back for their discomfort. His reason was somewhat similar to his more extreme tempered little brother, who insisted on starving himself when faced with a mental challenge. 

First thing, he must write back to Sherlock and once again remind him to eat. Mycroft was not on board with starvation, nor was he a supporter of anything Sherlock used as a method of self destruction, really. 

Drugs, eccentricity, and Germany. Mycroft warned Sherlock sternly against those things and issued empty threats, knowing Sherlock would only become more resolute in his pursuit as a result. 

It was entirely his fault that Sherlock ended up in Berlin. [1] Sherlock said ‘England is too mild for my taste’ as he went, smirking. Mummy assumed Sherlock was referring to lifestyle and culture, but Mycroft was sure his brother was mocking him and the entire British population in a sexual context. 

Of course, Mycroft would discuss none of these in writing. He had to pen every letter expecting them to be read by prying eyes. In their usual correspondence, Sherlock and him feigned a peaceful semblance, both too prideful to let on their fumes of sibling rivalry in written evidence.

_-It’s wonderful news that you are making new acquaintances in Berlin._ \- Mycroft wrote, while he was fully aware that so far, his brother only mingled with the other tenants in his apartment building, all of them British citizens who drifted overseas for reasons they are not willing to admit. The only local people Sherlock really got to talk to were his landlady and the money hungry boys who came to him in underground bars. 

Mycroft smiled as he jogged down his subtle put-down - _I urge you to come home this December and spend Christmas with the family. Should you wish to invite any of your friends, I’m sure mummy would be very pleased. It also would not be much trouble for them to travel home with you, from what I gathered_ \- because they are British - _even if documentations were required, surely we can work something out.-_

  


Mycroft wrote about the trivial events in the past week, and the unimpressive days he planned ahead of him, knowing Sherlock would deduce most of the details he intentionally left out. - _Last week’s London was full of wonderful surprises, both John[2] and Virginia’s letter arrived on the same morning, we agreed to meet at John’s club next weekend. A few journalist friends came by the flat for dinner on Wednesday. It proved to be a pleasant evening in the end, though none of them a worthy opponent to have in a game of chess._

_Then the weekend was lovely, I went to see Noel Coward’s new play in Soho with -_ Mycroft took a pause. - _Greg Lestrade_ \- He wrote down Greg’s name carefully, smiling.

\- _Gregory is a detective at Scotland Yard. We met in April at the boat race. I’m reminded of your great enthusiasm in detective stories, if you have questions for the officer, I would gladly pass them on to Greg._

_It rained on Sunday, so I stayed in and returned to some poems by good old Kipling. I hope you find some time to rest as well._

_This evening I am to meet with some journalists from the BBC. I will write to you again to tell you about my thoughts on the new programmes. The next evening will be better -- some committee meetings will be enough to entertain me, and the evening after that will be best, for Greg comes. -[3]_

A few paragraphs later, when Mycroft was almost at the end of his Letter, he came to a panic and wished to redraft it altogether. He could picture Sherlock taking one look at his words and throwing it across the room out of spite. 

Pale green eyes appeared in his mind, accompanied with a smirk. ‘Sentiments, dear brother. So easily compromised, even I expected better from you.’

Mycroft frowned, there was no escape from his memories. 

Sherlock’s voice was cool and emotionless, ‘Sex. That’s what it is. You haven’t been able to produce a single novel in the past few years because you discovered sex. Everything you wrote since then stink of masturbatory prattle and self-pity.’

 _I had revealed too much._ Mycroft thought. His brother would read between the lines, and easily deduce that Greg had stayed the night in the same bed with him. 

But would he be able to deduce further? Know how they had fallen back into that same bed in the morning, mouths attached, hands roaming under the sheets, and worked their bodies to exhaustion? 

And how Greg murmured countless praises against Mycroft’s collarbone, coaxing him into his lap, strong hands snaking up his back.

“Don’t hide now, let me see your skin.” Greg said, pressing Mycroft’s hands into the mattress.

“Move that pretty arse for me, lover.” Greg had said, circling his hand around their erected cocks. Mycroft whimpered and thrusted his hips forward.

“There you go...beautiful.” 

Mycroft blinked at the letters on his desk. He did not have to share his feelings to Sherlock at all, but he had no reason to hide them either. 

He closed his eyes for a moment, and allowed himself to sink back to the memories of Greg’s warm palms rubbing against his inner thigh. Dark eyes, locking his own - it gave him courage. It made him proud, and he suddenly held the urge to rebel against whatever part of him that housed his inhibition. 

‘Let them know.’ Greg’s low voice echoed through the fog in his head. 

Mycroft would let everyone know. He would announce it to the world.

How Mycroft fell asleep with his back against Greg’s heaving chest, and stirred, half awake, when their skin was uncomfortably soaked with sweat. 

How he leaned back into Greg’s arms when the air blew their bodies dry. 

How when he said goodbye to Greg on his doorstep, the man held his face in both hands, and leaned up to kiss his eyes. 

“We’re out in the open, Gregory.” Mycroft protested.

“‘M sorry, can’t help it.” Greg said, glancing around them. When he found that no one was passing on the street behind him, he leaned in once more and stole a kiss on Mycroft’s lips. 

Mycroft looked down at a sentence in the middle of the page, he crossed out the letter ‘I’, and replaced it with ‘we’. 

‘ _It rained on Sunday, so we stayed in.’_ He whispered the words a few times, as though to make a point.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] What Sherlock is doing with his life here is largely inspired by 'Christopher and His Kind' by Christopher Isherwood. Isherwood and Forster shared almost a paralleled relationship in many years, which makes me think about the Johnlock-Mystrade parallel. The title of the chapter is also inspired by Isherwood's 'A Single Man'. I'm sure a lot of you have seen the movie. It's really fucking sad but, lovely stuff nonetheless. 
> 
> [2]This "John" Mycroft is mentioning here would be John Maynard Keynes (the economist) and not our Doctor Waston. Our John will make an appearance later on in the story. 
> 
> [3]Isherwood and Forster shared a wonderful friendship over the years since the 1930s. In one of Forster's letters to Isherwood, he writes, "The evening after that will be better—a play by Virginia [Woolf] called “Freshwater”(or “an evening at the bay”),and the evening after that will be best,for Bob comes."


	6. Deferral

“You know, when I first saw you, I thought, there’s no way, he wouldn’t, not in a million years. Then we talked and you were so kind to me, I thought I was fooling myself that you’d actually want anything to do with me, but I couldn’t tell myself to stop. For as long as I can remember since we met, all I dreamt about was you. I thought, what if I’m never to dream about anything else ever again? Then I said to myself, well, that’s not too bad really, I can live with that.”

“What did we do together, in those dreams of yours?”

“Oh-just chattin’, most of the time---and then I’d wake up upset, because I didn’t realize we were in a dream. If I’d known that...”Greg lapsed into a long pause, and Mycroft encouraged, “What would you have done if you were to know?”

“Then I’d not fret about scaring you off, I’d...um...”

“-indulged a little?” Mycroft asked.

“That, yeah,” Greg laughed. “I’d have my way with you.”

“Are you still worried about scaring me off now?”

“No.” Greg said immediately, then he met Mycroft’s wise gaze and hesitated. “Well, maybe a little, from time to time.”

“I am not going anywhere, Gregory.” Mycroft said, as he leaned close and laid a gentle hand on Greg’s knee.

“But you’re just saying that.”

“I’m not.” Mycroft said. “Allow me to prove it to you?”

Greg felt himself shiver in excitement as Mycroft climbed on top of him and brushed their lips together. 

But Mycroft’s lips felt wrong - his body was too light - barely there. When Greg reached out his arms to circle around Mycroft’s waist, his lover disappeared in his embrace, like a cloud being blown apart by a sudden draft.

Greg opened his eyes, and found himself lying on his back in his own bed, alone. The grey ceiling of his home stared back at him with its stone cold indifference.

Greg grunted and banged his fist on the mattress.

* * *

Greg arrived at five in the afternoon, sharp, just five minutes after Mycroft began waiting anxiously in his living room. “Ah, Greg, just on time.” Not sure what to expect of Greg, Mycroft fell back into his usual patterns of conversation. “I was thinking maybe you’d like to join me for a brief walk in Brunswick Square? The weather is delight--” 

“Can I stay the night?” Greg asked, a hand around his waist, pulled Mycroft close to his body.

“Yes.” Chest tight against Greg’s, Mycroft lost track of what he wanted to say. Prior to Greg’s arrival, Mycroft had envisioned several scenarios of how their evening would play out. All of his contingency planning went out of the window as soon as Greg closed the door shut and looked at him with a face that meant he was clearly ready to get down to business. 

“I want to use my mouth on you.” Greg said, unbuttoning Mycroft’s shirt buttons with a feverish haste that made Mycroft want to swoon. “Why did you not let me last time?” 

“It seemed unbecoming...for our first time.” Mycroft’s arms hung by his sides - it was comforting, letting Greg in charge and take from him what he wanted. 

“And now?” 

“You are sure that is what you want, Gregory?”

“Yeah, sorry, I’m a bit, just-” Greg breathed, pausing. He pressed a long kiss against Mycroft’s lips and smiled. “I missed you. I had a dream that I lost you.”

Mycroft felt his heart squeeze tight, the thought of losing Greg...was unbearable, devastating, more devastating than if he was told he’d gone blind. “I am not going anywhere.” He said, running his fingers through Greg’s hair. “Have your way with me, that’s what I want.”

For a moment, Greg just stared at him in silence. In his wide eyes there was a mixture of amazement and thoughtfulness which Mycroft could not fully comprehend. 

When Greg did move again, he was careful, taking layers of clothes off Mycroft’s body as he backed them toward the direction of the bed. He was a lot more careless with his own garments. Hasting, he shed his wind worn coat and let it drop to the floor with a heavy thud, then his shoes were kicked off and rolled under the bed. There was an extraordinary youthful expression amid Greg’s impatience that made Mycroft want to smile. 

Greg pressed him down into the sheets and crawled between his legs with a playful grin. “Just you see.” He said.

“What is it?”

“Just you see,” Greg explained, “I’ll please you better than all your other boys.”

Mycroft shifted a little under the weight of his bed fellow, “There are no other boys, Gregory.”

Greg paused for a moment. “Not ever?”

“No, not that, just-” 

“Well, at any rate, I’d do you better.” Greg claimed, before he pressed his lips on Mycroft’s bare stomach, sliding south with the determination as if setting out to prove a point. Mycroft wished to say something to that, his sharp mind had caught a glance at something lurking behind Greg’s self conscious statement - perhaps something in need of rectification. 

But reassurance seemed easily ingenuine. Mycroft was not sure how to sound serious rather than sweet talking, when Greg was pinning his body down on the soft bed with an assertive hand, let alone attempting a cool headed declaration of something he did not even allow himself to believe in. 

Once Greg’s hot breaths were apparent to the skin around his groin, Mycroft knew that the last chance of speech was lost, or perhaps it never existed. The shadow of his moment of concern, however, stayed in the back of his mind through their act of carnal lust, like jagged rocks embedded under a running stream. A quiet unsettling note - unable to be kissed away by neither the kisses he bestowed nor received. The resonance of its ugly edges, simultaneously soothed and worsened by Greg’s tender - one might even dare to say ‘loving’ touches, brought on such a melancholy in his heart. 

It hid itself in the soft sighs he emitted as Greg stretched his intoxicating lips around Mycroft’s swollen member; when his body loosened in physical pleasure, he could feel it in the whine from the back of his throat, in the shortness of his breaths. 

Greg was there, labouring for him, powerful in his every move dedicated to take Mycroft apart - extraordinarily skilled, too. He could feel the dip at the tail of his bed where Greg laid his strong frame, but a thick fog of troubling thoughts shielded him from fully coming to terms with its significance. 

Moments later, Mycroft’s body was ready to step over its limit. The experience felt second hand, though. When rushing thoughts all came to a halt and he should submit himself into oblivious bliss, Mycroft screwed his eyes tight and sensed the souring aftertaste while he panted - but it felt more as if he was choking on a sob. His mind should be disintegrated by the forceful tides of sensation, but what claimed the moment was a painful sobriety he could not banish from his tightening skull.

A voice said - _not yet_ \- never, for what it may seem. 

Eventually, he had hoped, but never in this lifetime. Mycroft knew he couldn’t, wouldn’t dare ask for that eventuality —- now, what he shared with Gregory Lestrade, had to suffice, for it had achieved something no one had brought about in Mycroft for a very long time —- at least now, he was reminded of what it was like to _feel_ , be it melancholia or its temporary reprieve. 

It was true, it was real, and it hurt.

For a fraction of time, Mycroft thought of his brother Sherlock, and his loathsome needles. He thought of the silver lines disappearing under the boy’s fragile skin, penetrating his green veins; of how the boy’s eyes rolled back in its effect and how easily devastated he was in its absence.

Greg Lestrade, he thought, was his drug of choice. 

Mycroft could not say he was dissatisfied, for he could not even distinguish the source of his withdraw. He did feel marginally improved, when Greg quickly climbed back up and kissed him fervently, smirking smugly with innocent pride. The lewd taste of his own come between Greg’s lips offered him at least some proof to the authenticity of it all - When he was almost about to declare that he was still lost in one of his frenzied dreams about the beautiful, unreachable man before him. 

“You were exceptional, Gregory.” Mycroft said quietly. 

“I know.” came the husky growl laced with Greg’s growing desire. Mycroft could feel the stiff object of such desire burning against his bare thigh. Greg did not ask him to reciprocate. 

“Give it here, darling, your pretty hand.” He said, and there was that.

  
  


Sated, they lay in bed until the night fell, whispering quiet thoughts to each other whenever something came to mind. The warm brilliance of dusk filled the walls of Mycroft’s small flat at one point. He watched it linger on Greg’s arms and chest, making his skin shine. Then he watched it pass, saw it flicker and die like a pile of embers. Mycroft returned to his reveries when the world around him settled in grey - What had he learned from this great ordeal of confusion? What revelation, what resolution would it bring to the story that he wished to tell? 

\- The story of a boy so lonely all his life, who wished only to be happy, but failed to even identify what he wanted in the first place. A story told from far away, of longings so obscure - only to be voiced with metaphor and perplexed allusions in the moments one drift between dreams and consciousness - only to be voiced as cryptic questions of no importance. 

Have you ever dreamed you had a friend? A friend of flesh and blood, someone to share your whole life?

To what cause, for what price, in this predicament we brought upon ourselves?

Greg was flesh and blood, but was he?

“I have a brother, Sherlock, who currently resides in Berlin.” Mycroft said after a while, closing his arms around Greg’s bare shoulders. “Okay?” The man stirred, and Mycroft could feel the turn of those magnificent muscles under his fingers.

“He believes that sex had impaired my abillity to write in the past few years.”

Greg groaned and replied with little hesitation, “You know that’s bullshit. You have finished a handful of short stories, have you not?”

“Yes, but I have been meaning to write a novel, but found myself unable to. Besides, there is an unfinished work that has been haunting me for such a long time...”

“What is it?”

“ _Maurice_...It’s called - although I don’t think it will ever see the light of day.”

“Why ever not?”

“Its homosexual in nature, and, well, as I said, I cannot bring it to a satisfatory closure.” 

“What’s the story?” Greg encouraged, sparing Mycroft from describing the horror of his writer’s block in detail. For that Mycroft was endlessly grateful. 

“It’s the life of this character, Maurice Hall, who fell in love with a charming boy in college, then he was left on his own devices to figure out his own take on life and what he was to do with it.”

“Maurice Hall?” Greg sat up from Mycroft’s embrace, propping his head up with his arm.

“Yes.”

“M.H?” Greg smiled, eyes bright. As if he was one of those scholars who discovered a hidden treasure in the Aegean sea. 

“Quite right.” Mycroft laughed, looking down at the crumpled sheets between them. “ it is a little too revealing and riddled with personal sentiments, you see.”

Greg duck his head down to look into Mycroft’s eyes. “This Mister M.H, Does he come to a happy ending?”

“I haven’t the faintest idea.” Mycroft admitted, meeting Greg’s gentle gaze - you couldn’t lie to those eyes. For the first time in decades, the entire concept of a disguise disappeared in Mycroft’s mind. 

When Mycroft looked back on this moment many years later, he would smile and say from that point on, he had thrown himself willingly down a terrifying path of uncertainty and fear, knowing he had no choice to do otherwise - and what waited ahead for him, and Greg, was a million ways to self destruction, and a mere myth of salvation for them both to hang on to. 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> About the title:  
> The theme of deferral was evident in Forster's own life and in Maurice. From a deferred publication of Maurice and the short stories in 'A Life to Come', a deferral in his sexual satisfaction, the deferral in his queer identity and therefore his own chance of true happiness - for Forster, there wasn't much choice, and he could only look wistfully upon the possibility of a better Britain.  
> And on that note, I don't think I can quite jump into a happy domestic life between the two boys just yet, there are still endless issues to be discussed and resolved, through conversation, through time, and through, well, a lot of love making. And Forster was such a shy and repressed lovely man, his sensitivity I translated into Mycroft's extraordinary observational skill and his ability to empathize, and it would also take some time for Mycroft in this story to fully come to terms with the sexual activities he shares with Greg. I apologize that the smut is far from graphic at this point, it would become more explicit when Mycroft is ready to permit himself to contemplate his desire in that way without the burden of shame.


End file.
